Mobile usage soars, recording a 115 percent rise in 2013

If your perception is that every single person is now on a smartphone pretty much 100 percent of the time and the only reason that people aren’t being mown down in the streets in their thousands is that car drivers are slowing down a little to check their messages (OK, this last bit may be wishful thinking – despite all warnings and legislations against the practice, the idiots who use their phones while driving don’t even seem to consider decelerating, never mind just PULLING OVER for a precious minute), then the latest statistics would seem to corroborate your belief.

Flurry is a mobile measurement and advertising platform that tracks such things as usage of the mobile medium.

Simon Khalaf is a blogger for Flurry, who has shared the company’s latest findings with MacDailyNews. ”Overall app use in 2013 posted 115 percent year-over-year growth. (In this context, we define app use as a consumer launching an app and recording what Flurry defines as a session),” says Khalaf.

The findings have surprised no one, least of all Flurry. “For the past five years, we have watched mobile disrupt every industry, in every country, and continue to break its own records year after year. 2013 did not disappoint,” says Khalaf.

App usage has grown across the board over the last year, with even gaming (which had been thought close to saturation levels) posting a 66 percent year-on-year growth.

Utilities and productivity also grew substantially, as users increasingly utilise their smartphones and tablets as mini-computers. These two app segments recorded a rise of 150 percent in year-on-year statistics.

Eclipsing even gaming, utilities and productivity, however, was the Messaging segment. Again surprising few people, this segment (including social media and photo sharing) soared, buoyed by the surge of social media apps coming onto the market or consolidating their positions, and receiving blanket coverage by the media.

Khalaf points to apps like WhatsApp, WeChat, KakaoTalk, LINE, Facebook Messenger and SnapChat to illustrate his point, but notes, “What is surprising, however, is that the rate of growth (tripling usage year-over-year) dramatically outpaced other popular categories.”